City commissioner under FPPC investigation for not disclosing income

Andrea Shorter from the Commission on the Status of Women took an active role in supporting the efforts to remove Sheriff Ross Mirkarimi and defeat Supervisor Christina Olague, who voted to keep Mirkarimi in office. (Lea Suzuki / The Chronicle)

Andrea Shorter, a mayoral appointee and longtime member of the city’s Commission on the Status of Women, is under investigation by the state’s Fair Political Practices Commission for failing to disclose any source of income for at least five years while serving on the commission, state documents show.

Shorter says the issue “was just a misunderstanding” and she had recently filed updated forms revealing her employers and income.

“It’s amended, it’s fine and I’m cool,” Shorter said, adding that the Fair Political Practices Commission had informed her that the amended filings had basically ended the investigation. Tara Stock, a spokeswoman for the state agency, though, said the probe was “ongoing” and that she could not comment further.

Documents filed with the city’s Ethics Commission on Jan. 3 — about two months after a complaint was filed against Shorter — show she amended five years’ worth of disclosures forms to list her jobs, including serving as the deputy director of the nonprofit Center on Juvenile and Criminal Justice and program director for Equality California, a statewide lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender advocacy group. For both of those jobs she checked the box indicating her annual salary was between $10,001 and $100,000.

Shorter also registered separately with the city’s Ethics Commission as a campaign consultant on last year’s independent expenditure committee that successfully opposed Supervisor Christina Olague’s election in District Five, although the deadline for disclosing 2012 income is not until April 1. The committee was funded in large part by major tech investor Ron Conway, his wife Gayle, and Linda Voight, wife of real estate investor Thomas Coates.

Shorter is listed as the CEO of Atlas Leadership Strategies on the company’s website and on her LinkedIn profile, but there is no reference to the company in her updated FPPC filings. The company’s website says it is “committed to supporting candidates, elected and appointed officials make the most of their opportunity to serve in the public’s trust effectively, boldly, and honorably.”

The disclosure requirements are part of state and local law governing elected and appointed officials. They’re designed to guard against conflicts of interest by compelling officials to disclose under penalty of perjury any income over $500, including gifts and investments.

Aaron Peskin: It's preposterous to claim with a straight face that you can't read and adhere to very basic instructions. (Kim Komenich / The Chronicle)

“It’s serious when people don’t report things that state law requires,” said John St. Croix, executive director of San Francisco’s Ethics Commission. “It’s more serious when there’s a potential conflict of interest. That’s information the public is supposed to have.”

Shorter she was not trying to skirt disclosure laws and only thought she had to report investment or other income, but not her employer and salary. She said the instructions and disclosure form were unclear.

“It was just a misunderstanding in terms of what that source of income would be from,” Shorter said. “I’m 100 percent for complying, and it was not intended.”

Shorter has been on the Commission on the Status of Women for over a decade and previously served as its president. Then-Mayor Willie Brown first appointed her in 2000, and his successors, Gavin Newsom and Ed Lee, both reappointed her, according to the commission’s secretary.

Former Board of Supervisors president and local Democratic Party chair Aaron Peskin, who filed the complaint against Shorter that prompted the investigation, scoffed at the notion she didn’t understand the law.

“I don’t mean this in any way to sound pejorative, but if you have a junior high school education, the instructions are abundantly clear,” Peskin said. “If the (former) chair of this commission was so unclear on the basic ethics laws of San Francisco, the mayor should look for someone who understands the law. That applies to all commissioners.”

The dustup comes after a period of fresh tension between the progressive and moderate factions of the local Democratic Party – including the unsuccessful effort to oust progressive Sheriff Ross Mirkarimi and the defeat in November of progressive supervisor Olague.

Shorter played an active role for the moderates in both and has been involved in exploring a recall of Mirkarimi, who pleaded guilty to misdemeanor false imprisonment in a domestic dispute with his wife.

“You shouldn’t throw stones when you live in a glass house,” Peskin said.

Shorter countered that her filing problems were a minor issue.

“This is a very different type of infraction, so to speak, than domestic violence,” she said.